Wave of Shock: Prime Blood
by mamabot
Summary: From my AU, Shockwave's soldiers capture a Cybertronian Federal Park Ranger. From her first person perspective, we watch the Guardian of Cybertron fall for her in his own playful but guarded-protective way. Soundwave Shockwave brotherhood, Shockwave x OC. Mixed Hasbro Universes make the Prime Blood AU.
1. Chapter 1

Prime Blood~ Shockwave

a/n **_My AU, first person experiment that got some good reviews so I decided to expand it to a full story. My OC Ranger, so enjoy. {FYI, this is not MEEEEEE! just a fun experiment!} Ummm, it will get hot, but absolutely romanticly sensuous._**

* * *

I am no fool. I don't care what others say about me. There is only one who's option that counts and for the moment, and to others it may look like even he has abandoned us. Those would be the ones in that corner: silent in a near catatonic state. Those I can handle.

It's the others screaming and wailing and crying out to Primus and pleading for mercy. Really? Do they seriously think screaming and crying will make anyone change their minds and suddenly and let them go. Good grief! Was I the only one with a working processor in this place!

_WHooosh,_

of main doors opening. Silence always comes next from everyone. The thud. The clank of guards. The ring of shackles. They come to inspect us. They come to separate and categorize us. Experiment time. Who is the next target?

As the clank and clink punctuated by heavy peds comes closer, the groups within my holding cell cling together. The stupid ones try to contrive a way of escaping. I can see their processors spinning. Fools. They will get so many innocents killed.

Guards walk right past our cell. I do not cower. I do not scowl. I do not try to fight. I accept my fate. Whatever Primus has decided for me, I am powerless to fight. I will deal with whatever I have been dealt.

Screaming and wailing, a few sharp reports of single shots from a narrow gauged pistol come from the cell next to us. Smart these soldiers are. Ten femmes are shoved and prodded behind one guard shackled individually. One femme screams and tries to run. Where does she seriously think she is going to go? Idiot! Without even flinching, last guard hoists her over his shoulder and continues the procession out the door into Primus knows what experiment. And the doors clang shut.

The silence from Corner One of my cell continues. Corner Two brings up the wailing and crying again. Three continues to plan an escape. Forth is me. Alone. I do not sit with anyone. Am I the only one just willing to accept my fate?

A shadow graces over me. I do not look up. It continues to stare at me. I only turn my head slightly to catch the peds in my peripheral vision. I will not give the shadow the attention it wants. Nor will I give it the satisfaction of seeing me afraid.

But those peds. Clean. Large, able to support a solid warrior's frame. They have seen wear and tear, but they look like older scars, now healed over after turning to indoor activities. A gladiator turned commander? One that can walk in here without a partner? There would only be two and one I just saw leave. His peds weren't violet purple and silver, either. That remains only one.

I decide to take a chance, "Shockwave." I say his name as if acknowledging the time of day. No real surprise. Not afraid. Just a statement of fact.

"Come." He replies with the same tone. Reaching his hand through the electronic bars that bend at his mere touch, he grasps my bicep. With a tug somewhere between gentle and forceful, I comply. I slip through the bent bars due to his grasp. He releases my arm once outside to see how I will react.

Although I have to admit, my spark was tripping triple time, (who wouldn't) I will show no fear because it would change nothing. Instead, I stare at the gouge just left offside of his sigil on his pectoral armor. I wait for his next move. He doesn't. Apparently we are both accessing the other. Primus he shorter than the tabloids remark. But he is also broader in the upper chest and shoulders than they sneer. With a optic glance down, his hips are narrower. I would really like to look to his helm, but pride has me hold fast, returning to the gouge.

His hand comes up and takes my bicep again seeing how I will not react. I am escorted out of the prison. Out into the hall, we are alone, except the guards monitoring the entire prison facility at their stations. Their heads raise seeing their Commanding Officer stride by, snapping to attention. I expected cat calls. No, I was very wrong. These soldiers are very loyal to him and would never mock or encourage their CO. He does not need it. They stop their conversations and remain silent as we walk past.

I had no idea where I was being led. I would be lying if I said I wasn't afraid. I would be lying if I didn't say I was excited. I shuttered. He did not react.

Two more turns and we are on a hover platform. And straight up. I could see the shielded glass dome above us. Stars. I sigh with a smile, a beautiful last vision. The platform halts for a moment, I can hear a couple more clicks and then it continues. Oh, so the top three floors were only accessible to him. Interesting. The platform goes to the very top floor and then slides to the east side of the tower. My home.

He steps off without touching me. I follow. The platform dissipates and the hole seals over. No escape. Who said I wanted to? Shockwave wanders off some place in his quarters. I go to the window looking over my home: Sonic Canyons. I know I wasn't given permission, but I figure the worse he can do is beat me or kill me. Anyway, I rest my head against the frame. From this tower I can see near anything. It's beautiful.

I have no idea how long I sat there just admiring the beauty of my home, but a glowing object comes into my peripheral. I turn, a glowing cube of Energon is before me. I take it, not turning to my Warden? Silently we partake of the cubes and share the scenery.

I have no idea how long time had passed. The sound of a ping, drew his attention away from the window's sight. He did not move his body, just his attention to respond in Ancient Decepticon. I have no idea if he knew I knew it or not, but it was nothing but confirmation of supplies and schedule rotations. Nothing classified. He gave no reaction to the interruption, just a fact of life. Not even a reaction as to my reaction. Which was just to remain looking at the scenery and finish my drink, knowing he would have to go soon. They needed confirmation on an experiment.

I was quite right. He stood. I followed. The skid returned. We both stepped aboard. It lowered six floors and stopped. He pointed the black cannon at me, I remained aboard. The skid returned to the prisoner level. I stepped off. One guard came towards me and tried a molesting touch, but his partner slapped the offending appendage away. The rest of the walk to my cell was harmless. Until I was kicked in like stray turbo-dog at the pound.

And so began our silent conversations never looking at each other in the face. I lost track of days or nights in this place. As silent as he was, the company was very pleasant. The Energon not the best, not the worst. And occasionally, I was dropped off at the wash racks instead of his quarters. Thankfully the solvent was a neutral so a scent would not be noticeable to the others in my cell, who hadn't had the luxury. No one dared come near me. They thought the worst was happening to me never having any idea I was getting the best. And then it all changed.

* * *

~~~~~~ The Autobots attacked taking out several cells of the base. Our cells were in another portion of the tower that wasn't hit. Heavy damage to the tower itself was felt. The commanders were furious. I knew Shockwave had to be absolutely livid. I would be. Wait! Who's side am I on anyways?

Anyway. It took a few days for things to calm and repairs to begin. One day a guard finally came to my cell. He has to open the door, unlike Commander Shockwave. He was none too nice either. "Shockwave wants you! Probably needs an anger management session. Aren't you lucky?" He chortles greedily.

I was shoved onto the lift, falling to my knees. The lift was in an accelerated rate I had never felt before. I was very glad to be flat down when it jolted to a stop awaiting commands to the higher level. It didn't come. A hand reaches down grabbing the back of my armor, yanking me to my feet. I started to struggle to gain my own footing when I saw the flash of purple and sooted white. Instantly I stopped. The hand released. I gained my footing on my own. This time I face him. Face to helm. He steps back. I step forward. The lift disappears.

To the naked optic, it was a cold calculating face plate. The geometric face with the single golden optic. No visible mouth, nose or ears. To everyone else, per say.

To me, I saw a tired, worn frame. I saw a dimming optic, not bright like it used to be in younger hopeful days: like last week. I saw the drooped white angled helm antenna. I saw a very lonely being. A strong, confidant, powerful warrior and commander hit hard by a truth he did not want to face. Deceit. But it wasn't aimed at me.

I took a risk. I took a deadly chance. I put a hand to his cheek. The optic actually shut down. Slowly, the cannoned appendage came up between us and gently pulled my hand away. The commander did not want sympathy. The mech turned his back and headed for the curved staircase. I obediently followed. The next level was a lab. I could see at least ten experiments in various stages. Biology, chemistry, engineering, even one on linguistics and a drooling femme's optic sight. The mouth, yes he has one, is broad. Um, how to describe it? Broad lavender lips with the hint of sharp denta poking out. When I quirk a smirk, he actually smiles back and was that a hint of a blush? The smile pulls his lips back revealing not fangs, but a near double set of mandibles. He would be deadly on the battle field just showing these. As a smile, devastating to a femme's spark. I look away to hide my own racing spark and flush. He releases the helmet to my care.

Then turns away and activates his shower. I head to the other area a of the room and attempt scrubbing his armor to it's former glory. To my amusement, he is right within my line of sight. And boy does that mech like to shower. Or is he putting on a show for me?

Raise that stump and show me that muscled bicep while the sponge bubbles and glistens down the barrel sized ribbing accentuating the battle scars. Then back up to the pit and turn that waist just so I can see the bubbles trickle down the center line, lavender lips of the spark slit, slipping down further where-

I look to the armor and know it will take more than I can give to get it clean. "I think it needs to soak," I finally give up and say. He flicks a finger to a switch on the wall. I activate it and see a soaking tub for his armor. I shoot him a scowl. He could have told me sooner. He quirks that optic and smirks back, sliding his hands down those very sexy hips. Ohhhh that bastard knows exactly what he is doing to me. He knows he is incredibly sexy and uses it to his full advantage. Bend and lunged to cleanse the thigh- Ah! I'm gonna beat him with this armor! Fragger!

Carefully I set the armor to soak, keeping my back to him, and growl. He chuckles. Even that deep chested rumble is sexy. Oh I want so badly to turn back to him, but I will not cave. I am no school bot who swoons at a naked mech, no matter how deadly and gorgeous and tempting... Nor am I a pleasure bot who will willing throw themselves at anyone to get what they need to survive. No, I will not. I WILL NOT!

"Come." He calls plainly. I try to ignore him. It's more forceful this time, I say COME." I have no choice. So I turn. Yeah, the poor mech did need help with his back where there was a wound. I step into the shower and take the brush from his offered appendage. I carefully scrub and cleanse the injured area. He begins to groan in relief. I want so badly to touch him more, but no. It wasn't offered, I will not partake with my hands. Just my optics.

Slap, whap, splosh, clang! The next thing I know, I am pressed to the floor under his muscular weight, his thighs clenching my hips fiercely. The optic is a blaze of fury. The body is tense, pent up. He wants something from me. What? Oh Primus does it really have to be those hips touching mine? I bite back my whine.

"I am no virgin, but I am no floozy either." I jut my chin back.

He smiles, "Yes I know. You are a federal park ranger for the Sonic Canyons." I shouldn't be surprised, but I am. "You prefer the company of the native wild life over your fellow citizens. My crew never would have captured you if it hadn't been for bots thinking the wilds were the safest place to hide. You see," he chuckles evilly, "Decepticons know all about foraging, dodging and hiding like wild animals. We've had to for so long." I say nothing. I'm too floored (literally) that he knows this about me. And then he leans in, "Nothing to say?"

"Does it matter?" I blankly reply fighting the urge to wrap my fingers around those hips struts and grind...

"Not really. But it could decide the levels of fun or pain."

"You are going to do what ever you please. Primus gave me a processor and I fully intend to use it." I'm arguing more with myself than him.

He pulls back to really get a good look at me, still sitting on my hips, which I have to admit feels way too good. I was beginning to heat up. He asks, "So are you trying to escape?"

"Not yet. I haven't seen a need to. I have good Energon, no one is shooting at me, I'm not responsible for anyone's care. The knowns far out weight the unknows out there."

"You guess wrong!" He snaps and moves.

I would not call it rape, because I enjoyed every moment. I tried my ever loving best not to let him know. But it only spurred his adjustments further. And then I was screaming in an ecstasy I had no idea was possible to attain. And then the bastard left me there on the shower floor in after glow only watch him give himself the final release. He pleasured me, but would not allow me to have the satisfaction of pleasuring him with the final release. Oh no, he did not! I snarled and growled from my place on the cold wet floor while he stared at me and finished the job, growling coyly, mechly at me. Evil bastard!

And then, I was sent back to my cell. He got what he wanted. Riled me up, got his wound cleansed and left me aching for more. Damned Decepticon. I'll show him.

* * *

It was near three weeks before I was pulled from my cell again and dragged up to his quarters and thrown to the floor at his feet. He lowered himself beside me and cupped my face. The helm was off. He kissed me. Last time he did not. This time, he decided he would only use his dangerous mouth. I was NOT going to let him win again!

I failed again. He succeeded. Once again I was forced to watch him finish the job. Oh he is glorious with his luscious neck laid back, lavender antenna pert as he moans in release. I want to be the one to release that noise from him. What the Pit has happened to me? "Frag'n 'Cons," I spit. He chuckles flicking fluid from his long and dangerous fingertips.

Sent back down to my cell alone again to seethe.

* * *

This time he only made me wait three days and came for me himself. No one from my cell tried to protect me. I didn't need them to help me. I needed me to help me. The lift did nothing to help. I could smell him and it already had my system churning. I knew what was coming. But I had to turn the tides. I would not let him win this time. No. He just began that chuckling again like he could hear my internal battle. That absolutely delectable soft rumbling of amusement. I hate him. The lift stops.

This time at his private quarters. I refused to step off. He turns back and stares at me. I shake my head. Both of us knew he hadn't actually hurt me in the past. Just my pride. He raises a hand and gently takes mine. I let him and don't pull it back. He clenches and yanks hard. I crash against his frame with an ooff. The lift disappears He chuckles again. I moan in defeat.

This time he used a combination of deft fingers, that sparkling-soft smooth appendage and his ped. I had no idea one could use a ped toe in such a way. It should be illegal. My pelvic and belly area were cramped and sore from the repeated overloads. He would barely let me catch my breath and then push me over that erotic cliff again. This time when he tore away from me, he nearly didn't make it to his shower in time.

I turn away putting on my armor, ready to be lead back to my cell. I couldn't bear the thought of watching him do that yet again. Most certainly not after what he had done to me. I swiped a tear away at the moan coming from the tiled walls. I made my way to the lift station carrying the remains of my armor. And wait.

Still under the running water the voice commands panting, "Not this time." I freeze. The water stops. The damp peds pad heavily yet softly towards me.

I continue to put on my armor. But even one handed, he quickly sheds my park service armor. Grabbing my chin he makes me face him. This time I do show my fear. But it is my fear of giving into him again and not being able to walk without cowering in overload the next time I see just him. I shake my head in a plea.

He gives me no choice. The reduced arm presses into the small of my back forcing our hips together. The fingered hand forces my neck to the side where those mandibles do sinfully delightful things to my sensory systems. With an ever so slight adjustment, the shorter arm is now sliding down my aft and under the crease, lifting me just enough off my peds to take me to the window seat over looking my Sonic Canyons.

He lays me back. Pressing his heated body to mine, I whimper, "more, please," I gulp.

Once his cube was gone, moon and mech slip away. He says nothing to me, just locking the door so I can not go to the lower levels. What did he expect me to do until he returns? The mech was complex and confusing.

I decide to relax with my cube and gaze at my untouchable home. But that can only last so long before one feels depressed or even more confused. Stretching carefully, I make my way to the shower. Mind as well. I have to admit, his massage was better than the hot water, but this would have to due. And where is my armor?

Alright, that was done, now what? I turn to the remains of the loft and explore. Our window seat. The wash rack. A locked closet. A linen closet. (I grab a sheet and tie it around my body until I can locate my armor.) Half a kitchenette. Carefully I make my way to the closed off section. Testing the repair shield, I can see it will allow me to adjust it. With a couple commands, I can see the extent of the damage. Wow. The Autobots did quiet a bit. Library, personal berth room, personal closet, personal weapons locker and numerous personal areas had been destroyed. I started to chuckle, "People who live in glass towers, shouldn't -"

And there, it caught my optic. A smashed picture frame. I didn't finish that phrase out of guilt. I made my way over carefully stepping only on the scaffolding struts and picked it up. Soundwave and Shockwave together. I should have known. The older brother here as Guardian of Cybertron, while the younger one is TIC with Megatron on Earth. I scoop up the picture and take it back to the small counter I found in the kitchenette. Pulling the stool out, I can see it was done in the old fashioned way of electrifying the metal plate causing paint to adhere. I spent quite a good while messing around with it with the tools I found in an unlocked drawer beside the locked cabinet. Leaving it to recure the paint, I went back to see if there was anything else I could salvage.

A few cushions, a couple holocubes of classic literature, a carving of Driller made by young hands, and a couple other things. Carefully I set them in the next window sill over from my "berth". The last thing I did was probably the most dangerous. There was a huge berth hanging off the edge. Shockwave is not what one would conceder a small mech but this berth was massive. Carefully I was able to remove the linens, shake out the rubble and get them into the cleaning device.

The stupid thing I did next was to try bringing the berth back onto stable flooring. I was left holding onto one of the pads while the lower pad and frame went over the edge and fell to the ground way below in a mangled mess. I cringed in horror, easily I could have gone with it. I was so sure someone would come storming in and physically berate me for loosing Commander Shockwave's berth! After a few moments, no one did, so I continued with my remaining prize. I was able to drag it up to what was left of the repaired floor. Silly as it may seem, I was bound and determined, I would not feel the need to spend my stasis with him. NO! He would have his own place. YES.

By the time I had the stasis pad cleaned, burned edges trimmed off, the laundry was done. Good thing, I needed to refuel and stasis. Swiftly I made up his berth and got myself some fuel from the kitchenette. I left the good stuff alone, no need to be greedy. Settling myself back into my window seat. I savored my little bit of freedom and fuel. My optics drift close pressing my fore helm to the cold glass.

Drowsy with stasis, it felt like somebody gently laid me down and tucked me in like a sparkling. A deep warm voice whispered, "Thank you," in my audio receptor while darkness and warmth continued to surrounded me.

I woke up in my cell again. A lot less femmes. No younglings or sparklings. Glancing around at the other cells, there was a lot less there too. Something was changing. Or was something increasing? Three weeks I was left to ponder, wonder and contemplate the changing situation.

* * *

~~~~ A green claw gripped my tan bicep. Yes, I was back in my service uniform armor. "Time to go to work, femme." The voice was serious and firm, not teasing or a hint of sarcasm. This time he clamped my wrists in stasis cuffs behind my back and led me to the lift. The guard rode with me all the way to the private quarters. We did not step off. I twitched, he kicked. I heard a grunt. And then I tasted floor. The lift retreated. The stasis cuffs fell off. Slowly I rotated my helm and saw my capture. My warden. My erotic torturer. My savior? He was turning his gorgeous violet back on me. A thumb stroked the picture frame in the kitchenette holding the brother's image. Rolling to my aft, I pressed my back to the wall and just watched him prepare two cubes. Setting the helmet aside, turned resting a hip against the counter, he sighs heavily.

Turning again, he saw I did not stand, but waited. He held out a cube, I refused to move. So he put it on the counter and shrugged, consuming his. Still I refused. He refilled his. I took a chance.

"I may die for this, but so be it. I really have nothing to loose. What is going on?"

"War." Plain and clear.

I rolled my optics, no duh. "Why the femmes? And where are the sparklings?"

"Slagger Optimus PRIME!" His half filled cube slams to the counter sloshing another half out. A round fires from the cannoned fist through the damaged section of his loft. I cringe.

The purple chest heaves in anger. Waiting a few moments, he then turns to me and offers the cube again. This time I approach and take it, resting against the counter with him in like manner. Sipping, we both stare at the hole in his construction shield.

"He ejected the cube." Shockwave says it softly this time. "He ejected our future."

I really wanted to counter that option with the other side of the story I had heard within my holding cell, but reason over rode impulse. I sipped silently.

He continued. "I had to round up what was left of our potential future. Mindwipe was sure he had a plan to save our race even without Water from the blessed Well. I had faith in him." The strangle slowly grows, "He had solid theories. The results were promising. I trusted HIM!" Three more rounds fired. I carefully slide three steps away. The optic was narrow as a laser beam, "He betrayed us all. He wasn't even CYBERTRONIAN!"

At that, I gulped. Shockwave had been betrayed by his most loyal scientist. Not only that, the scientist betrayed all Cybertron. The white helm purple with anger snarls, "I am Guardian of Cybertron! It is MY duty to protect Her from all enemies. Most certainly a foreigner under my own roof!" He was seething. "I told him I needed more soldiers!" Short staffed by his Lord.

I lower my face. I will not let him see that I feel sorry for him. I will not show pity. Although, my spark prays he will get through this. I can not believe I am siding with a 'Con I lift my face and look into his optic with pride, my guardian?

He is surprised by my reaction. I lean in and kiss his mouth tenderly. He tries to fight the need for touch and comfort. This time, he fails. I deftly stroke his cheeks, stroking up to the antenna. He moans deepening the kiss. I allow him to push deeper, but I will dominate the caresses. He lets me.

When I feel his temperature begin to rise I whisper, "Can you let me go?"

Softly he shakes his head and nuzzles into my neck. "It's not safe out there."

I keen and ask with a husky tone, "From whom?"

"Me," and sinks those mandibles to grip my neck without actually causing harm. It was the hand on my hip, with deft fingers wriggling into the crevice of my armor to tingle my underarmor that was the dangerous appendage.

And then he stops suddenly, pulling back for me to see his serious face. I understand now. No one knows about what is really going on up here with us. He can show no weakness. I know he is feared as much as his Lord Megatron is. Loyal servant to the Decepticon Warlord, protector of Cybertron until he comes back to claim it, or Prime extinguishes his very spark. He can not let me go. Caressing my cheek he gives me a sad smile, and yet, he can not let me stay as even a concubine or companion.

Dropping his hand, he strides away not telling me he is sorry. Instead I finish the statement, "You never would have found them if they had been smarter." He doesn't turn, so I scowl and continue with my own anger, "I mean slaggit!" the lavender tips perk, "Refugees, fine. Hiding and running, fine. But really? All the debris, garbage and foot prints. Seriously? A vacuum droid could have found and captured them." Shockwave laughed. He actually laughed at the truth of the statement.

So I scoff, "Oh yeah, you go ahead and scoff. You weren't the one happy as all get out in her secluded home amongst the wild life and my natural canyons of song and spirit when the screaming wailing and crying came. They came begging me to save them. I tried, but they wouldn't listen. And then the warriors came and destroyed-" He turns waiting for the next line. "- my life."

Honestly, we were in the same position. I was only trying to save them and the natural inhabitants of the canyon from destruction and extinction of war. Wasn't that what he was trying to do for the Cybertronian race as Guardian? A sacred and honorable duty.

We stared at each other and then floor. What was left to be said? "I just want to go home," I whisper.

"Me too," He whispers back. We both turn and look to the destroyed half of his home. Then we look to the canyons where I can not return.

I stride forward and strike him on the Decepticon shield with a fist in frustration, "I hate you and everything this has done." He lets me pound a few more times on him. I am no weakling, but am seriously out of shape due to my imprisonment.

Then he snaps. Grabbing my wrist he snarls back, "I hate you too and everything you represent."

* * *

~~~~~ This time it really should have been called rape. On who's side, I will let you be the judge. Armor was torn away at the hinges. Catches were sprung. Antenna were bent. Cries were emitted. Bites and scratches brought forth blood. Tears spring forth. The sheathing was forced and violent before the complete armor is removed. Claws were raked across very sensitive areas. It was a fight of limbs for striking. It was a fight of glossa for dominance. It was a fight of processor vs. it's own spark for control.

"I will not beg you!" I bark and scratch.

"I will not ask you to!" He growls and plunges deeper. I cry in delight, he moans in anger.

The battle continues leaving us rolling on the floor in fury with ourselves and each other. And then I can feel it, after my third. He is beginning to tense and bristle with static. His needs will release soon. This time I will not let him escape. I latch my peds around his calves. He will have to break my frame struts to get away this time. I dig my hands in deep and hard into the remaining shoulder panels clinging even harder. He throws his head back trying to yank away, but his arm is trapped between the floor, my aft and our combined weight. He jerks again. Perfect. I lunge and sink my blunt teeth hard into the exposed soft under armor of his neck marking him.

A primal mechly roar emits long and hard reverberating, making the very glass in the windows rattle and his body shake I heard the plates separated, and the light begin to glow. "Noooooo," I hissed this time. Too caught up in his own disgusted self, he slumped to the floor beside me. I curled within myself and howled, trying to shove my spark away. "No. No, this isn't happening and that growling howl. It would rival any of my Sonic male cyber-bears. And I?

I cast the thought aside deciding to concentrate on my bears. Normally if a female was in heat, she will wander through a male's territory and mark on top of his scent telling him she want him. He will come by and sniff it. A lot can be told by her scent: age, past cubs, illness you know. But it's not that. I just don't like people and their stupid social classes and chatter about inconsequential matters. I like nature. I like the simplicity of nature. It has reason, it has rhyme, it's own symphony.

"My brother said the same thing."

I don't move. "Telepathic too, are you?"

He chuckles ruefully, "No. Sonic Canyons. Kept trying to get me out there to see the beauty of it. Tried to get me to understand their waves of music. You know him and his music." To that I had to smile, everyone knows of Soundwave and his music. The voice orders, "Come."

This time I respond, "No."

And then a word I never thought I would hear, "Please?" Every so slowly I turn expecting to see a cannon at my head for refusing him. What I see is a smile. "I will take you out."

I point down to the dungeon, "Take me home and leave me there to die." He huffs and turns his back on me making way to go back to his lab. I have just refuse his compassion just as he has refused my pleasure. "Shockwave" pulling the elegant stopper, he takes a swig and hands it to me. I swig as well, like my academy days. A couple more times we pass it. Then he leans in, I lay back.

"Let me make love to you, Ranger, on your turf." I only nod. "After all, it's only fair, don't you think, after all the time in my damaged home?" I don't think I responded the rest of the night with a coherent word.

Here among my soft ground, listening to my beloved canyons sing a love ballad while the Guardian of Cybertron softly caressed my body with his it pained. Pained? Not my pain we've gone and actually done it?! I look down to my chest and there, I can see the toasted marks on my spark slit. We bonded without a gap between us: skin to skin: the most passionate way possible. That means, what ever emotional pain I'm feeling, its' mine. It's his? Shockwave feel this much seething emotional pain. Betrayal?

* * *

It was several days before he came back. In that time, I knew something else had happened. How do I tell him while he is in this much pain? Primus guide me, please.

Alone in the tower, I was getting scared. I could hear the rumors through the chattered call and cry from the lower floors. Peace? Treaty? New Prime? Plus the crazy weapons fire outside the tower. Like fireworks in the sky. Some coming a bit too close for comfort.

I was not ready for the blast in the ceiling and Shockwave's private shuttle Boltz to push her way through. Thrusters still active, the door slides open. His purple palm thrust out. This time he will take no other answer, "Come to me."

I come closer and ask, "What is it?"

The helmet is yanked off and thrown into the damaged room. Electrical and communication connections are sparking and damaged. "He betrayed me too. They all did. Everything I fought for was for not. I stayed here in solitude and sequestered for him to actually merge and become the new Prime with his brother? Even my own brother bows his knee to them. I. Nothing."

I reached out and took his hand, "No, Shockwave. Not for nothing. For everything. You did it. You kept Her safe. You kept me safe."

A tear slips from his optic, "I'm not ready to accept their terms."

I smile and squeeze his hand, "Then don't. But," I tug, "I will go with you." He pulls me aboard and tightly to his chest.

Burying his face in my neck another tear leaks, "I am not weak. I will not cave to a Prime no matter who half of him is."

"I know." I hold him tight. Eventually we will have to face the new Cybertronian race or else . our sparkling will be very lonely in their adult life, something we suffered together.

"Oh Primus, it worked," he gasps.

"It worked." I nod. And then it hits. The Autobots and Decepticons together saved the Cybertronian race.

Autobots launched the Well. Secretly both sides had stolen the remains of the Well Water in hopes of preserving their race via their faction. That secrecy actually forced propagation on both sides. And now, Shockwave looks down to my spark, one of them is his. He saved his heir's home.


	2. Chapter 2

My Au b Prime Blood/b  
Soundwave~Shockwave brotherhood  
Soundwave x (femme) Skywarp  
Shockwave x my OC Ranger's first person's perspective

~~0~~

*mechly deep sigh*  
I turn to my purple sighing mate but he is still looking out the windshield of his tiny personal ship Boltz steering her south as far away from Tarn, Kaon, and Iacon as possible. He has not said a word since pulling me out of his Tower, inside his ship, and closing the hatch. Not only has Boltz's hatch been closed down air tight, but so has our bondlink. I can't sense anything from him and even his facial expressions are stoic.  
I know it was only a few days ago that we bonded and then he swiftly left me locked securely in his private quarters of the Tarn Tower while he went to meet the new Prime. There really hasn't been time to explore this thing we share called bondhood. I don't need the bondlink to see how hurt he is by what has become of the Warlord he served. In a way, he feels betrayed, so his tone inflected on our departure. I will not tell him he is wrong to feel this way, but I will try to let him know he is not alone as he searches for his new life.

"Shockwave…?" I get up from the copilot's seat and lay a hand to his cannoned-wrist as I push out as much compassion as I can through our bond. I am desperately hoping that he can feel me pleading-bleeding through his wall.  
The look on his adjusted helm says more than enough but to add a bit more, he lowers the wall just enough to let me feel he received my love. My chin begins to wibble while I look deep into his troubled optic and ask, "Is there room for two in your seat?"  
It might take him a moment to understand all that I am asking, but he hears me. With a few punches to the auto pilot, he then parts his arms welcoming me to his lap. I don't waste a moment lowering myself down and curling against his broad chest. Like cargo tie-downs, his arms wrap securely around me keeping me tight to his chaise. To make me feel even more secure, he opens his side of the bond even more letting me know he promises to keep me and our sparkling safe.  
In reciprocation, I rub my hand against his covered spark, "I know, Shockwave, I know."  
Nothing really needs to be said right now. This ending of the war is not what either of us expected.  
I'm not a fool, I did know there were problems with our society but I Iwas /I foolish to think it would never effect me locked away in the seclusion of the Sonic Canyons. I really didn't think as a mere Park Ranger I would be captured by either side. Killed by their volleyed arsenal , yeah sure, but never captured!

Soft mandibles against my helm top bring me back to the present. "This isn't what you expected either, was it?" I hum my thoughts into his warm throat.  
"Um, no," he continues to graze his face into my warmth.  
"Shockwave, what did you expect?"

Look, while I was his prisoner (or consort, or whatever) up in his private quarters, we didn't talk like this. We slept together, we fragged, we goaded each other, silently we held each other in our sleep, but an actual relationship, no. I don't think he ever intended to bond and I've been racking my brain for days trying to figure out why he offered his spark and his life to me. Hopefully I will find out now, after all I must mean something to significant to him for him to come back for me (without even knowing for sure if the sparking had been conceived). He could have just run, but he didn't. I snuggle in again and he soothes me once more.

Just as Boltz breaks into outer-space taking us to orbit one of Cybertron's moons, he rests his chin on my helm giving me his ponderings. "I know logically there were many potential endings to the war, but the two I expected were either my death and thus never seeing the end of the war, or my Warlord winning and I being part of the science team to rebuild our home."  
I soothe him with both my hand and my love again. Yes, as crazy as it sounds, I love the mech that captured me. No, that's not entirely accurate. I love the mech that silently trusted me into his life when he had no reason to trust me. I love him more now that he is trusting me with his deeper thoughts.  
I know that many would not believe the feared and highly intelligent mech is capable of such tender emotions as 'love' but love is more than fairytale feelings. Love has to do with trust, promise, hope…need. Deep and complex emotions that I never wanted to deal with…until him.  
"I love you," I find myself admitting out loud.

Instead of saying anything, his hand slowly strokes up and down my arm as his faith in us strokes up and down our bond-length. He may never say those three words to me, but I don't necessarily need him to either. His trust in me -in us- means more than anything.  
"Thank you," he murmurs back in the same soft tone one might say 'I love you, too'.

*sigh* He brings his knees up too and now we are like a tight ball curled up in this seat together. I can't see the stars outside the window. All I can see is violet and lavender before me. I don't know if he can see the stars either with his face buried in my helm top, but I do know there is something else troubling him.  
A tremble reaches my spark from him. A third betrayal. My hand and spark soothes again to let him know I felt that message.  
"How could he bend his knee to him after everything…," and a soft cuss.  
I don't ask to whom he is speaking of for I feel he will tell me when he gets his pain contained. I will just be here for him.

Maybe I should be worried about where we are going or what we are going to do now, but some how even though he feels lost and betrayed, I feel safe with him. I'm not a dingbat who is blatantly and blindly following him, I just have faith that between the survivalist in me and the fortitude in him, we will find a way some how.  
"Do you want to stay here on Cybertron or do you want to go else where?" I give him the encouragement to either ask me for my advice but also letting him know I will listen to his concerns as well.  
"I don't know. I'm done fighting, that I do know. There is just no point." The defeat in his voice from a proud and powerful commander is more than enough to crush anyone.  
*sigh*

The warm hand on my arm rubs me again. "I am so sorry, Ranger, this isn't at all what you expected. Please, enlighten me, tell me your thoughts." With a kiss to my head, he is searching for something else to think about other than his own pains.  
My spark flutters to know that my own thoughts are a welcomed solace to him. "I miss my Canyons. Thank you for taking me back there."  
"Um hum, they are remarkable."  
"I know a place we can stay in there, if you are interested. It might not be as modern as you are used to and there's no mass of communications-"  
"I have no wish to communicate with anyone," that came out ice cold. So cold my spine chills. He must have felt it too because in the next moment my chin is lifted so I can see the warmth of his golden optic, "Except for you."  
How does he do that?! One moment my spine is chilling from his cold tone and the next it is shivering in euphoria from his warm gaze. My smile blushes up to him for me to receive a light chuckle from his barreled chest.  
I bonk him lightly on the chest for doing that to me, "No, you are remarkable, Shockwave."  
"Yes, I am," the genius admits with a hint of cheekiness.  
Okay now I want to smack him. He's not being truly arrogant, just honestly stating a fact about himself with touch of smugness. Such confidence! I'm glad to see it hasn't gotten lost in our escape, though. "Bastard, " I snuggle up to him.  
"Um, maybe." He chuffs.  
Something wriggles between us causing me to look. It's his hand stroking over my chest where our little one is growing. "This one will not be," the tone is now warmly serious again.  
What can I say? Nothing, so I lay my hand over his and we stroke our new little life together.

* * *

~~0~~  
I don't know how long we stayed snuggled up together circling the moon when he starts to squirm slightly. "Are you alright?"  
"I need *cough*…up." Ever the gentlemech's touch to a situation, he chooses his words carefully.  
"Oh! Got it." I quickly get off his lap so he can… take care of something personal. As he swiftly rounds the corner to the 'head' I settle back to the seat keeping it warm for his return.  
I've been in a transport before, and as a youngling did a tour in a cockpit, but I'm more at home in my open crags than a ship. Still, I know a communications device when I see it; we had radios in our remote look-out stations, after all. On the Boltz's long range com-unit, I see someone has been trying to reach Commander Shockwave. Apparently for days by the long list of transmitted contacts. Since our flight from Tarn, four more messages have come in.  
As his mate, I don't know if these messages are personal or not. I don't quite know where our privacy line is yet. I knew where it was when I was a prisoner in the Commander's personal quarters, but everything has changed now. Everything.

**ping** Another message is coming in from the same sender. It's flagged as urgent this time so the rescuer in me reaches to activate it. "Hell-"  
A lilac hand slaps the line closed before I can even finish my greeting. Instinctively, I jerk my hand back from where it had been slapped. He wasn't slapping ME per-say, he was snapping the line close, that much I am sure of. Still, I crossed a line and recoil from my mistake with my mate.  
**ping, ping** comes more instantly.  
This time the lilac hand swiftly unplugs the com-wire to the control board before his large frame sinks to the copilot's seat disgusted. "I don't want to talk to my brother right now."  
"Brother? Oh…. Soundwave?" The picture I restored of the two of them still sits on the nightstand back in the Tower. So it wasn't over looked when we left, it was left on purpose. Ouch.  
Softly he nods. "I'm not ready to face another betrayer." His fist is still clenched tight around the communications cable connector.

I remembered what he said about Soundwave liking the Sonic Canyons, maybe that won't be the best place to go after all. Too many painful memories, perhaps? Instead I stretch my hand out and cover his fist to make an alternate suggestion, "We could head over to the Manganese Mountains instead. I'm sure I can find similar Park Ranger shelter there."  
That must have surprised him because his head jerks up to look at me directly. The tip of the helm, the cock of the short antenna say a lot silently, still he adds vocally, "Was there some place else you had in mind?"  
It takes me a few moments to decide if I should make the painful offering, but I gird myself and go for it. "I was going to suggest a remote area of the Sonic Canyons that has an abandoned shelter when the more modern station went in, but… on second thought, maybe someplace completely different would be better."  
He stares at me searching my spark for my true feelings. I can feel him probe the bond to find out if I'm lying to him about my offering. I hold nothing back. He needs full trust right now and I let him feel that I am fine with abandoning all hope of ever returning home in order to give him peace of spark.  
"Come here," is a whispered order.  
With a tug to my kaki hand, I find myself standing between strong violet thighs, with a cannoned arm caressing my lower back. "No, we are going to your home. I want to feel more of this peace you are giving me. Take me to your home."  
A kaki thumb rubs over a lilac back, "Only if you really are sure." I had to smirk a tease to the deadly warrior who is more at home in his pristine labs. "I have to warn you, there's dirt."  
The biggest smirk comes out on the darker face, "There's a difference between dirt and filth, Love."  
Lunge. That's right, I throw myself against him clutching him tightly. Not for taking me home, but for calling me 'Love'. It wasn't a flippant title and means so much more. I didn't mean to be so emotional, but the sobbing starts. All this while I should be supporting him in his time of utmost pain and strife and here I am crying like an idiot.  
The arms tighten around me as the chest rumbles in amusement. "Shh, it's alright. Let go, let me feel it all."  
The last time he saw me let it go, he impregnated me. What will happen this time? I can feel his side of the bond open fully. Not just the bond, the chest plates are pulling back and begging me let it all go within there. My own chest plates respond swiftly to his spark's calling.  
Not only is his spark stroking, kissing and cuddling mine, but his mouth is kissing and stroking mine. His hands are tugging me down into his lap where I will remain secured against his protective frame.

Connected at the spark, not only do I show him my love for him but I can show him the peace and serenity my vorns in the Canyons has brought me. Wave after wave pulses the sweetness and comfort both his companionship and Cybertron's nature have been to me. The memories of his comfort and Sonic songs have saved me from going insane in the solitude when he had to leave me in his prison cells.  
In return for giving him my comfort, he sends back to me his gratitude of strength and even teasing chides. Gratitude for me allowing him to toy and play with me for his own pleasure. It was never done sadistically, just playfully maliciously. The moment I pinned him down and stole his overload was the moment he knew he was in love. It was both a defeated blow to his ego and a surge of passion to his spark. It was that moment that he was not going to let me go and yet… found he needed to protect me as much as he was guarding Cybertron.

"Oh….Shockwave…," I plunge deeper.  
"My tenacious, Ranger…," he clings tighter and laughs when I can't remember what my parents once named me only knowing what he calls me now.  
His warm mechly laugh is more beautiful than any sunrise over my home. This is my home now: HIM….US.  
Pulse after pulse, we feed each other until our sparks can not take it anymore and burst with overloaded emotions. All that is left is the sound of pinging cooling metal, panting vents and a single tear drop.

It takes a while for us to come down off our high, but when we do, it's agreed upon to head for the Canyons. To my delight I am pull back into his lap in the pilot's seat again. This time though, his hand is over mine showing me how to pilot his ship.  
"You need to know how to fly… just in case."  
Kaki crimps over lilac, "There will be no 'just in case'."  
"Do not be a fool."  
"Do not underestimate us." Chocolate brown optics pierce golden with her own deadly glare in warning.  
"Yes, it was my folly to underestimate you," gold tries to melt chocolate with that warm look.  
"Not me, us." Foreheads are pressed together.  
Violet snorts back, "Watch where you are going or this trip will be very short."  
Damn, I hate it when he is right.

* * *

~~0~~  
It might be the next day, but daylight is still in our favor as we bring Boltz to land. I show him an old shed that was used to house rescue equipment (now empty as it was pillaged during the war). With numerous veins of lead in the walls, it will be a natural place to shield her from scanning arrays. I gather up whatever medical supplies, tools, and rations we could need to set up a home with. Shockwave disconnects anything that could drain the batteries or otherwise track us. He has made it clear he does not want anyone to find us at this time.  
As much as I would like the brothers to bury their differences and have peace in their sparks with each other, I will not betray or defy him. Maybe he just needs some time. He's been through so much already, I do not want to add any more grief. My duty as his mate is to stand by his side and help him heal into this world.  
"Ready?" I pull on my pack seeing him snap a last hatch panel closed.  
"Ready," he holds a hand out for his own pack.  
Together we shove the mangled doors back into somewhat-place and head out like a pair of ancient pioneers.

* * *

~~0~~  
*pant pant* "Look it, Studdly Warrior, I gotta take a break," Primus I feel pathetic sinking to a stone and shrugging my pack to my pedes.  
The strong and virile mech doesn't even look winded one bit. He's about to tease me when a thought crosses his face and lowers to a knee before me. "Are you alright? The sparkling-"  
I wave that worry aside, "No, it's not that. I haven't let myself get that tired. Don't worry, sire." I try to smile his worried thought aside.  
"Don't call me that," comes hissing out. Instead of answering my curious expression to him dismissing the standard title for a siring-mech, my mate hands me a cube of rations.  
After a couple swallows, I have to know. "You are the sire of this sparkling, what do you want to be called?"  
"Father. It carries more importance than just one who demands respect for seeding a life or holding a rein." Oh that had and icy touch to it. 'Sire' has a bile taste to him right now considering he feels his reining leader did wrong.  
With a clearing breath, he gets back to his first question, "Now, are you sure you are both alright? Please let me look."  
As much as I want to be proud, self sufficient and independent, I know the scientist in him needs a hope to cling to and something for his mind to study. Nothing better than for him to study his greatest creation making sure his legacy comes to a healthy life. So I relax and let him take the scanner from the med kit.  
After a few hums and ha's, he puts it away. I shove him the rest of the cube, but he tries to flick a finger ordering me to finish it. "If I try to, I'm going to be sick. I just need to catch my breath. Take it, don't let it go to waste."  
Best way to counter logic is with more prudent logic. He takes the cube and finishes it off.  
The break gives me a chance to look over this end of the Canyon. I didn't make it out this far very often. Someone else normally covered this end. Guess it's all up to me now.  
Sitting silently gives us a chance to take in some of the native wildlife. A turbofox, a petro rabbit, even a few pack-retrorats make their way in this peaceful life. And then a breeze bringing the canyon's name to life.  
"ummm," I close my optics and just breathe it all in. The scent, the feel, the sound… heaven. A hand slipping its fingers between mine just makes this absolutely perfect.

* * *

~~0~~  
We didn't make it any further that day. Before I was captured it wouldn't have been a problem for me to trek further, but being locked in a prison cell (or even an officer's quarters) for all these months has left my hiking muscles to atrophy. I just don't have the stamina I used to. Now that I am home, it is something I plan to remedy soon enough. For now though, I will take it easy and not risk the precious life I carry within. No need to do anything stupid for it's not just me anymore. For the first time in my life, someone is personally counting on me.  
He might have been Guardian of Cybertron and I protector of the Sonic Canyons, but now we need to look after each other and this little one together.

Around the next bend of the abandoned path, we find the entrance to the old station. "It might not be much too look at but, here goes nothing!"  
No electronic lock to this shelter. Nope, an old fashioned pressure lock. Punch in the right series of pressure points and the tumblers fall in to place. Well, and a good whack with a fist where the dirt wants to stick the tumblers. There, the shanks separated and it can be slid out of the housing. Shove the bar-shaft aside and yank the storm door. Dank, musty and stale, but still solid. It can still provide shelter from a cyclone or deluge of rain.  
I have to feel my way along the wall to find the shutters to a back window. It's not just a back window for ventilation though, as the huge door is folded back against the wall. It's a balcony overlooking the south entrance to the canyons. We've made it in time to watch the sunset.  
"Magnificent," I hear my mate gape to the sight of shadows elongating and fading away in the dimming light while the breeze sings it's sonic song.

* * *

~~0~~  
As the weeks pass, we get into our routine. The first few weeks we had both slept in full armor just like service members at the ready. But after one extremely passionate night of lovemaking, we were both too tired to redress. It was actually wonderful to wake up naked against each other curled under the thick blankets with the whole natural canyon as our mural. From there, we began sleeping in the buff.  
Also those first few weeks, we always remained armed; just in case. Shortly after that morning though, Shockwave didn't bother to put on his cannon. Maybe it took him a little bit longer to be comfortable with his constantly exposed deformity around me, but I said nothing about it. It's part of who he is and makes him no less a Cybertronian. If anything, I am marveled at the things he does with the shortened stump. (Some of them elicity sensuous!)  
Part of our morning routine is a hike to the bottom of our gorge to refill some of our containers with fresh flowing Energon from a small spring. From there, he begins his lap of running to stay in shape and check the perimeter like a guard. I haul the containers back up the hill reconditioning my own body and having cooled Energon for him when he returns.

With it being a bit warmer today, he has decided to take his lap wearing only his lower armor and leggings. Those tight abs of his, barrel chest and delicious shoulders are bare to the morning light. It took me longer to make it up the hill watching him run off half dressed. In fact, I got out the binoculars just to watch him make the four-click lap and come back down the plateau trail to our home.  
I try to just hand him the cool cube when he gets back, but my optics won't leave his firm half naked form now glistening from his work out.  
"Last night not enough for you?" Ferally the tone comes out setting the empty cube down.  
Nothing is hidden, he knows I tracked him the whole time burning with lust. "Never."  
"We should do something about that."  
My back is pressed to the outside dirt wall of the balcony as the mandibles sink into my collar. There is no need for foreplay, he's already given me more than enough of that by his morning patrol.  
With a violet knee pressed to the wall, a service green thigh hitched over his hip and a kaki hand crimping to his damned sexy aft, his name is cried out over the edge of the ledge in the most natural way possible…..

… Thank Primus I am pinned to the wall or I would be sliding to the floor. Panting into our afterglow, his face is tucked into the hallow of my throat giving it soft nips and plucks.

"So Shockwave… this is how I find you communing with nature?"  
I don't recognize the femme' voice, but apparently my mate does because his whole body stiffens pressing me protectively tighter to the wall. Startled, instinctively, my hands dig in harder to what I'm holding. Unfortunately, it's his naked aft.  
He hisses to both of us but glares to the femme that of us both lock our optics to.

Seeker. Purple and black with long beads from her uncovered helm. The helmet is in her hands but she holds nothing else. No weapons are even mounted to her arms. She might have been teasing him, but her posture is that of one bearing a message. "Hello, Shockwave. Can we talk?"  
"I have nothing to say to my brother, Skywarp, and if you don't mind, I would appreciate you leaving me to my privacy." The hand to my side is more than protective, it trembles ever so slightly as if he's afraid I will be taken from him.  
Skywarp smirks, "Shockwave, if you wanted privacy, you certainly should not be fragging a femme so hard that her voice carries like a signal beacon. Even you know how sound waves carry; no pun intended."

This time my mate snarls and then barks, "Get OUT! Don't EVER come back."  
But the femme doesn't move. Her face goes taught and the ruby optics narrow in her own dark warning. "NO. Not until you hear what I have to say. I did not come for him, I came for MY sparklings… Uncle Shockwave." The staring contest continues for a moment and then she gives a deep sigh. "I will wait for you outside." She starts to move but then turns back and looks at me directly. I think she's hoping I can talk some sense into the stubborn mech. "Forgive my intrusion, femme. My name is Skywarp, mate to this stubborn aft's brother. Hopefully, -for his sake- this makes you and I family as well."  
Shockwave's pursing mandibles and growl make it clear she should leave and she takes the hint exiting the front door.  
That leaves Shockwave and I and a very uncomfortable situation. Do I side with her, like my spark want to!, or do I side with my aching brooding mate?


	3. Chapter 3

Wave of Shock 3

Silence. Deadly silence from my mate after the purple and black femme walked out the main door. He hasn't moved, keeping me protectively and nakedly pressed to the dirt wall of our balcony. Yes we are still physically connected as well, but with the heaviness of the moment, it won't be long.  
Still, I will not let him retreat just yet. My knuckles slowly graze up his spine feeling every single taught vertebrae joint. He won't face me and the wall to our bond is coming up again. I wonder if he's afraid that she will be able to feel him as well and thus putting up any and all defenses he can.

There, his knee comes off the wall and my thigh slides down his to also rest my full weight on the floor. His stumped arm slowly caresses up and down my side. I'm not sure if he's trying to soothe me or himself, either way, I continue to feel my way up and down his softening spine waiting for his next move.  
A deep inhale and a tensely slow exhale, he breaks contact with me still saying nothing. Yes, I know what I want to do, but this is a family trust matter and I need him to know I would never betray his trust or honor. "Shockwave, what do you want me to do?"  
I guess that surprised him, for he stalls in redressing. "What do you mean?"  
Snapping on my own service-green and kaki-tan bits I shrug, "You aren't seriously going to just leave her standing out there for infinity are you?"  
"I do no care to hear what she has to say," and continues getting dressed but doesn't look at me. The punctuation to the lie is when he slips his cannon back on clipping in the power cable. He hasn't worn it in weeks and now with his sister-in-law suddenly here, he does?!  
"Would you mind if I hear what she has to say?"  
A rather icy reply comes back with a deadly glare, "And why would you want to hear anything she has to say?"

Now I know I loved my life as a hermit, but my spark is breaking for my mate. At one time he was very close to his brother, from what I could see by the way the arms were looped around each other's shoulders in that old photo from their younger days.  
I never had a sibling, but I did have a dorm-mate that I cared a lot for. She helped me through the rough parts of life and leaving home. Graduation day was bitter sweet as she went to teach sparklings and I went to my first remote posting.

I can't imagine what it would be like to be raised with someone since my first memories and then join a faction in a war. To fight, bleed, and strive side by side together only to be separated by duty, pride and honor? It must have been pretty hard to let Soundwave go off to Earth while Shockwave stayed here to guard the Motherland. That separation is one thing, now their relationship is being strained again for an entirely different sort of distancing? To sever a piece of your old family just as you are starting the next leg of your own new family lives? How can he just ignore what Skywarp has to say?

I look down to my spark where our little one is still in the first stages of incubation. A little ball of energy soaking up whatever I have to offer growing into a more solid pulse of life. I really hope to have more sparklings with my mate. If the Autobots really have found the AllSpark and are returning it to the Well, there is a possibility of more than just Skywarp and I having more sparklings. I know Shockwave told me the way I was impregnated was because of the secret vial of Well Water he slipped into my drink the night we bonded. It took just a small amount of catalyst water to fused his transferring mech fluid within my gestational chamber with my own coding fluids fusing it all with the energy surge of our spark-bond to create a new life. I want more sparklings for him. I want our sparklings to not only have us for family, but to have an extended family. I was a fool to believe my hermit way of life was perfect. It wasn't perfect until he capture me away from my solitude and forced me to see there is more to life. Love of another.

"Yes, Shockwave, I would like to hear what she has to say about your family." A plea. Not an order, not a bark, just a plea.  
The golden optic watches me for a few moments and then falls back to his cannon checking it's settings.  
"I will not cross you, though." I have to say it out loud because I have no indication if his spark is hearing mine.  
The lilac hands softly fall to their sides. After a very long pause he whispers. "My family?"  
"Our family?" I try again with a grimacing as my voice squeaks at the end. A smile breaks out across my face though to the cute way his helm tips up to my squeak. As serious as this moment is, my spark perks to his un-gruffed reaction. "Well…?"

"If you feel the need to speak to her, I will not stop you. All I ask is that you do not reveal our sparkling yet."  
"Alright, I can live with that…for now."  
A scowl is what I get in response to the last two words, but the approval is all I really need. With a last look over of myself, I pull on my service hat and softly walk to the door. What am I to say to the mate of my mate's brother?  
A warm presence from behind, clipping my service pistol to my hip, lets me know he is not going to let me go out there alone. I smirk over my shoulder to his very protective stance, "Love, she does not have a weapon. I am more armed than she. I don't really think we need to worry that much. She just wants to talk, right?"  
The grip to my chin is harsher than I have ever felt before as my face is jerked over my shoulder. He's never struck me and never seriously attacked me, now, this grip is painful. The glower in his optic is worse though, "Do NOT be a fool! You do not know all that Skywarp is capable of. She was not made leader of the Seekers division after her Commander and Captain were killed for no reason. Not only is she an excellent officer to her division, she is a warper. I will NOT allow her to touch you and risk you being warped out of my grasp. DO I make myself perfectly clear?!"  
A crisp, sharp, deadly order. I would be an idiot to defy. Wisely, I just nod.  
"Good." Simple punctuation to the situation and my chin is released.  
My hands are now shaking so bad I can't open the door. I'm more afraid of hurting him than I am of meeting her. With a chuffed-vent, a soft hand grips my forearm in compassion before he opens the door for me.

Together we walk out the door to the open porch with him only a step behind me. Skywarp has a handful of rocks in one hand and the other is chucking them out over the cliff edge. She's not trying to hit any wildlife (thank goodness!) but she is trying to hit a target. A large dirt mound a good ways off on another ledge. It wouldn't be hard to hit it with a rifle or even possibly my pistol, but hand thrown rocks gives it a different sort of challenge. Primitive, sparkling like, relaxed personal game. I like this revelation of her personality.  
"Hi," I walk up to the railing at her side and watch her chuck the next rock. It glances off the side of the mound taking a chink down. Oh, so she's trying to whittle it down from this distance, even more challenging. Creative.

A charming smile and a swish of her black & purple beads smiles back to me, "Hi. I'm Skywarp," she extends her hand but then pulls it back when Shockwave growls out a warning tone. "Shockwave, please, I come in peace. We are family whether you like it or not. Those sparklings need their uncle."

"Rumble and Frenzy are not sparklings and they are not my nephews." Cold and to the point rumbles forth. He's pressed so close to me, I felt the vibrations.  
Skywarp takes a deep breath, letting it slowly exhale through clenched teeth. Clearly she is trying to get her thoughts together, keeping her anger in check. "I know. Soundwave told me how you and he found Rumble and Frenzy in their dying forms and that together you managed to transfer them to compact smaller bodies. Unfortunately, the procedure would mean that they would be dependant on him physically for upgrades and other various things. You never considered them as sparklings, but Soundwave did consider them as if they were younger brothers. As much as you protected and guided him, he wanted that for them."

"Skywarp… sentimental rhetoric is not going to help this." Shockwave turns his head to the open canyon and away from her trying. He tries to end the conversation.  
But I'm the one who wanted to hear what she has to say, so I press on. "I'm pleased to meet you, Skywarp. My name is Ranger. The Sonic Canyons were my home before the war."  
"Really! Well well, how in the world did you ever meet Commander Cold-spark? Are you mated or just frag buddies?" Skywarp is trying to teasingly goad information out of me, but I can feel the hurt in her words as well as the jab to him. Without any idea who we are, her words and tone have bite.  
It takes all I have not to send back my own bite. "I love Shockwave with all I have and have no regrets on how we met. If anything, he saved my life."

That does surprise Shockwave enough to whip around and stare at me incredulously. I flare out my gratitude to him for saving me from a life of loneliness and giving me a bright future I never thought I would have. His wall waivers and surges back a reciprocating feeling. He never thought he would find this elusive feeling called 'love' either.  
Having been slighted by Shockwave's cold reply to her outreach, I don't blame Skywarp too much to being jaded. I also have no idea how much of our last lovemaking she saw, so I decide to reveal something she and I have in common. "Shockwave and I are bonded. Being bonded yourself, and seeing how you are here to try easing some of your mate's pains, I hope you can understand my standing by Shockwave's side. I will not do anything to hurt him."  
The beaded helm nods softly letting some of the tension melt out of her shoulders. Instead of throwing the rest of her rocks, she carefully sets them to the railing we are all leaning on one by one. "Ranger, how much would you try to help him?"

"What are you getting at?" I take up one of the small rocks set beside me to examine it.  
"Soundwave and I have found the sparkling my first mate Thundercracker and I had."  
Once more Shockwave's head whips around at the warrior femme. "WHAT?"  
Skywarp nods, "Yes, Thundercracker and I were mated and he knew I was incubating. That is what killed him… protecting us. Soundwave helped me get the pod to the Autobots because I was afraid of raising him with Megatron after I saw what was becoming of Rumble and Frenzy. I was forced, in a way, to take up the role as Commander, but I gave up my role as mother."  
"You gave your unbirthed sparkling to the enemy?" I'm the one to ask not the fellow faction member.  
"Not the enemy. I knew they had the location of the refugee planet which even Soundwave couldn't find and I knew Optimus would follow my request to protect an innocent. I knew that they would make sure he was raised away from this war, which is something I could not count on with our own leader. Shockwave, Skyfire brought Thunderwarp to Iacon at Mega Prime's request as I went to get Slipstream and her son. My son was there when I brought forth Soundwave's first daughter. Her name is Melody."  
"First?" Shockwave nearly chokes on the word hearing all this new information.  
"Yes, first. I am still carrying two more. Please Shockwave…," her hand reaches past me to lay on his wrist. "I'm not asking you to move to Iacon or to join us. I understand that just might be too much to ask. All I'm asking is that you talk to your brother. He's worried about you. Do you wonder or worry about him at all?"  
The violet arm doesn't move out from under the other but does return the lone optic to the horizon. Compassionately he pushes out his spark's truth, "Yes, of course I do."  
"Do you want a family?"

A pregnant pause. There's a lot in that question. Does Shockwave want Soundwave in his new life? Does Shockwave want his own little ones? Does Shockwave want his little ones to know his brother's little ones?  
"I need time." Now he does move out from under her hand.  
Sadly she pulls her hand back to the pile of rocks before her. "Answer me this last question and then I will go."  
"I never said I would answer any of your questions," he mutters back.  
"Fine then, smart aft! I will ask you one more anyways! How did you see the end of the war? Even Galvatron knew he couldn't keep this up and made peace with his brother. Don't tell me that peace is what is going to split your brotherhood. This is supposed to be a time of bringing families home and back together. You should be proud of all you did to keep Cybertron from being overrun by the Morgans, pirates and any other group. Soundwave is very honored to call you his brother!"

Maybe it's a stupid question to anyone else, but she's searching out Shockwave's frame of mind.  
"When you walked away, it was like a blow to his spark. He loves his sparklings, but they will never replace you. He needs you too. Until all are one?"  
"Go back to your sparklings, Skywarp." That was all the blessing he would give her at this time as he goes inside closing the door behind himself.  
It must mean he has some sort of trust towards Skywarp to allow me to be alone with her. I have a feeling her information and probing questions have punched a few holes in his wall with Soundwave. There's a strange wavering in our bondlink. He's going to need to go for a run again, but he doesn't want to be that far from me until she is gone.

"Are you two alright here? Have enough rations, shelter anything you need?" Skywarp pushes out all that concern she would have given Shockwave if she had been sure he would give her a truthful answer. "It's a bit rustic out here." Her nose wrinkles.  
With a light laugh, I ease her worries. "It might be rustic, but it's also very peaceful. There's no shells going off and we have each other to depend on. There is no one else we have to contend with or question."  
She nods softly into that. "Yeah backstabbing, lying, spying all that can take a toll on your spark. I can't blame him for that." She shuffles a few rocks around. "It grieves me that he feels Soundwave is one of them he can't trust."  
I stack up a few rocks myself trying to keep the momentum of the conversation. "I know I don't know everything, there's a lot Shockwave has purposefully not told me to protect me. I'm grateful for that, but also worried myself. Just… tell Soundwave to hang in there, alright?"  
Long black digits place a rock on top of my pile, "Maybe it's not just him who needs to hang in there."  
That does make me curious and I look up to her. "Slipstream has lost her mate, in a way and yet still has this tiny son. I could use some help with her. You sound like a neutral."  
"POW, Neutral.. Eh, whatever. I'm a Cybertronian that much I do know."  
"There's not many of us femmes. Sure the Autobot have a bunch more they have birthed during the war, but still some of us older ones kind of need to lean on each other as our officer-mates get used to the new world order."  
Once again I nod but this time lay a hand on top of hers. "I'll be here for him. I'll do my best, but I will not manipulate or trick him into feeling like he's being goaded."  
Skywarp grips my hand. "You take good care of our Shockwave then and I'll be in contact." With that, she steps towards the closed door. She gives it a soft knock. "Shockwave, I'm going now. Thank you for seeing me."  
Only a grunt for a reply. Sometimes he can be such an aft.  
Skywarp though shakes her head and snorts, "Yep, they are related." I laugh and she blinks away leaving me alone on the porch.  
My optic catches someone on the opposite side of the canyon waving to me. I wave back and watch her dive off the plateau edge, flipping to her Terajet form. With a crack a sonic boom, she's gone.  
Now I need to face my brooding mate.

I know he needs some space but also needs to know I am safe. He's no longer in charge of watching over his brother, the Motherland, or even his science experiments. All he has right now is me and his growing sparkling. Two of the most precious things he could ever guard.  
"Can we go for a walk? I'd kind of like to go out to my last post. Who knows, maybe there is something there we could use."  
Thanks goodness he nodded into that. We pack up a few supplies because it will be a good long hike for us. Now that I am better conditioned, I know we can press on further than we did our first day returning to the canyon.

* * *

~~0~~  
"Hum… well, certainly looks the worse for wear," the building is pretty much collapsed. Looks like when his troops came through they raided all the good supplies and smashed a lot of other things after they took the prisoners away.  
"Too late to head back tonight." There is a grunt of disgust to him. "How could they be so careless!" A disgraced hand flicks to a damaged radio that was further destroyed by being exposed to the elements.  
I know I'm the one who should be angry at seeing my home smashed and destroyed, but I can't be for he is more than furious. The Commander in him is disappointed in his troops handling of his orders. "Such waste!"  
With a growl, he has to walk away. "I'm sorry they did this to you."  
It's been a long time since he has mentioned anything of taking me away from my home. Before it had always been orders, logical, just following procedure that had but me into his prison and I understood all that. I didn't really blame him, after all, I too just followed my superior's orders. I understand chain of command perfectly. Likewise, I can understand his disgust to his subordinates not following his orders.

This too will pass. For now, we need to settle in for the night. Clouds had followed us all day and knowing my Canyon as I do, rain will be here shortly. Luckily my berth had been a large one. This station had cut a shelf-like notch into the cave wall making for a firm solid berth with a natural solid rock covering. There is no fear of a mud slide burying us in the deluge that might befall the night. We've even been lucky that the retro-rats have not made a nest out of the padding.  
So while Shockwave picks through the remnants of the radio, telescope and other equipment, I get the berth cleared and prepared. This was always my favorite spot in this shelter because from the snuggly spot I could look out over the plateau. Even now, I can see the rain in the distance making its way over. It's going to be a summer-muggy storm.  
"Shockwave, will you join me?"  
Thankfully he sets the pile of salvageable parts into a box and tucks it up under some shelter before joining me on the made berth. Handing him a cube of warmed up Energon, I lean my head to his shoulder. "Thank you for coming out here."  
"Hm," he doesn't agree completely with that thought.  
"I'm actually kind of glad to see it destroyed." That earns me a cock-eyed-antenna expression. So I giggle back. "I know you and I haven't talked much about our faith in Primus, but maybe this is the sign I needed to confirm it was all meant to be. There's no going back to what was before. Now there is only going forward." I even flick a finger to the broken holoframed image of my parents. There's nothing that can be salvaged of that unlike the one of the brothers.  
"You are so optimistic, Ranger."  
"Oh not always," I snort back to him.

With a sip he leans down to examine me, silently probing me to continue.  
So I slip an arm around his cannoned one snuggling in. "I knew there was nothing I could do about being made a prisoner, but I just could not find myself hating you when I should have. You toyed with me like a cyber-cat with a micro-mouse. It was the worst torture you could inflict, -and yes I do know about your cortical-patches.- making me want you so damn bad but not letting me into your spark!"  
There's a cheeky flare to the mandibles and if I'm not mistaken a bit of a blush to his cheeks. "I'm not sorry."  
That earns him a slug in the shoulder to which he chuckles with mirth. "You bastard. Just answer me this, how many femmes did you take to your berth and play with this way?"  
The bond-barrier drops fully as he plucks the cube from my hand and sets it aside. "None, spare you."  
Ohhhhh Primus. I am laid back and under his heating frame. "I saw you come in with the others. Silent accepting your fate. I saw you, a loyal servant of our government - protector our natural homeland- and yet all the other prisoners ignored you. You who have the survivalist training, who tried to lead and guide them to safety when they came to you for help, but when you were all captured, they turned their back on you when you could no longer be of use to them. No comfort for you. You weren't angry towards them. You almost seemed pleased to be left alone. It boggled my mind."  
Now he nuzzles into my arching neck, "There's a natural scent to you. Primal. Honorable. Natural. Pure…."  
All of this I had never heard before. I might have felt his respect and love for me in a way he could not understand before, but now I am fully understanding it all.  
"I didn't mean to bond with you that night. I planned to drug you and try impregnating you without a bond. I had no plan to give you my spark, but there you were…" his spark is flaring against mine once again, "… there in the mist of a storm, crying out my name in passionate abandonment in your natural environment. I knew I could not let your spark belong to any other but me. Mine!"  
I'm left arching up as the mandibles sink into my collar marking me once again. Lighting might be striking the ground outside our shelter, but my spark is shooting off it's own bolts of passion. In no time at all, I am once again letting all of Cybertron's plains hears the cry of my spark. To my spark's delight, my name joins his ricocheting through the thundering storm.

* * *

~~0~~  
When Shockwave lays to his side with me spooned up to his front, I feel like we are equals in our cuddle for each other.  
When he lays out on his back, arm tucked behind his neck while I lay a thigh across his hips, snuggled into his side, and he lays that hand across my back, my whole being swells with contentment. The feel of that warm spark pulse under my palm…hum.  
But when I lay on my front, tucked under him, with him laying across my back, thigh against mine, I feel pinned under his protection. Squashed into soliloquy.

Tonight when we had laid down in this hallow-nitch of a berth area, he had me tucked up against the rock wall leaving his back to the open. I've never met anyone who has tried to protect me so much. I should be insignificant compared to the powerful and high ranking officer he was, but even when we slept in his quarters, he held me these ways, in silent ways of showing me his emotions. Rarely did I sleep without him holding or pressing to me in one way or another. Before he even trusted me with his spark, I was always guarded over in something as simple as sleep.

Yet I'm cold right now. The loss of his body heat is what has awoken me tonight not his actual moving or the pitter-patter sound of raindrops on the crumbling shelter. I might be snuggled under the blankets, but it's him I want snuggled up to me. I need to cuddle and protect his woes tonight not the other way round.  
Searching the room with just my optics, I find him silhouetted by moonlight sneaking through some broken clouds. It might be lightly raining where we are, but the clouds are breaking up off in the distance letting moonlight in. His elbow leans high up on the remaining strong wall along with his hip, stump rubbing his helm top, allowing him to look out a damaged hole to the plains beyond. In his hand is a soft glowing cube of Energon resting against his other thigh. My guardian looks like a sentry. A sexy sentry at that, clad only in his tasset.  
I watch for awhile until my body shivers. "Sh-shockwave?" It comes out huskier than I wanted, but still projects my need for him. "Is everything alright?" I don't want to take him from his post if there is real danger.

He turns, finishing of his cube, before setting it down in his stride back to our berth. "Everything is fine, don't worry."  
Pulling back the blanket, he settles down beside me on his back, tucking the stump behind his neck.  
"Of course I'm going to worry. I love you, I will worry for you."  
He gives a huff as if that is a light slight to his mechly (and Commander's) ego. Now it's my turn to show him my care. With a couple flicks, and a lift of his hips to allow me to chuck the tasset to the floor, he lets me take over. Nothing feels better than to run my hands over a toned mech's torso. Change that, my mech's body. Others might think a massage is for the receiver, but many a time it's for the giver as well. Tingling to the digits as they run and ply over the warm cybernetic muscles making the other hum out…ummm.  
That's right, my mate lets me make love him allowing me to suck the woes out of his mind for awhile while the world rains down around us.  
No loud cries this time, just soft kisses, warm touches and pushing each other back into sweet sleep.


	4. Chapter 4

The trip back to our original and more solid shelter is uneventful. Well maybe spared from enemy sneak attacks, bad storms or even rockslides but what we do experience is more of nature's glory. Cyber-coyote pups innocently chasing each other off in the distance, a cyan-cougar basking in the sun so lazily he couldn't even be bothered to give us more than a one optic glare, and then there are the petro rabbits.

Oh gosh that was too funny! Here we are just making our way along the path making no more sounds than soft padding to the trail, when two petro-rabbits dash out from under a magenta-Manzanita bush right in from of my fierce protector. He jumps back so fast he lands one broad pede on mine with his warmed cannon at the ready. The only thing though is that he is looking for traps or bigger prey not bouncing bundles of brown. I can't stop myself if I tried, -and I do try!- but fail, bursting out laughing so hard I have to sink to the ground covering my mouth.

The hiss he calls off to the two terrors bopping off down the trail sends me further over the edge with the tears beginning. "I-I…(ahahha) "I'm sorry Shockwave. (hahaha snort-snort-snort) "  
"No you're not!" The proud mech is trying so hard to regain his dignity but I think my snigger-snorting isn't help any. "Ohhh…" The lilac hand comes to his racing spark. "Primus, that hurt."  
Rubbing the heal of my hands into my optics I don't see him sink down beside me until he starts laughing too. A good laugh. A long held in deep rumbling laugh. One of those contagious laughs that can only be shared when you laugh at your own silliness.  
"Don't you dare repeat this. I have a reputation to uphold, you know," he tries to give me a menacing look even though the shoulders are jerking in giggles.  
"Oh really? Like your ticklish spot?" And I go for it.  
With a sparkling's slap he tries to bat my sneaky paw away but I take full advantage of his one hand (for I know he would never play around with swinging the heavy cannon). A tussle and a rumble in the dirt leads to more giggles, sniggers, snorts and a great big cloud of dust.  
"You are a dirty fighter!" he snerks.  
"You have a filthy mind!" I wipe a smudge off his helm top.  
"Takes one to know one." pokes back before kissing me.

It takes us a while to get moving again. Not because of love making, but because that tussle has left me a bit more tuckered than thought possible. Tucking ourselves under an over hang, I nestle myself between his V'd and splayed legs, leaning back against his broad chest. I love the way he just runs a couple claw-knuckles along my arm that is propped up on both of our bent knees.  
"How much younger is Soundwave?" Maybe it was bad to talk about his family, but I figured something so factual would be innocent enough conversation starter.  
"Not much. Before I was even birthed, they had petitioned for a second sparkling and it was easily granted. My father was of a political caste and it was expected of me to follow. I studied, but science was always my spark's desire."  
"What was expected for Soundwave?"  
"Hum..," it's a serious pondering there bringing the stump (cannon set aside for now) under his chin. "I know they hoped for him to go into something financial, like the investment industry. He's got a good head for forethought and numbers. He wasn't even out of the University when the war started."  
"Now that you have had some time, have you thought any more about what you would like to do now?"  
Now the stump turns my chin softly bringing both of our tipped faces closer. "I love you very much. I knew bringing you into my private chamber was no mistake. Some of them thought I was a fool or just releasing my mechly-needs. None of them understood the depth of my mind and spark's needs…save you. You know, Commander Coldspark."  
The sweetest and pulling of kisses shows that he endears my company even more than my body. "Never forget I love being with you."  
For that I snuggle into him watching his two brown terrors come back to their bush. He playfully snarls at them which only sets off my giggling again earning me a light slap to my rump.

~~00~~

* * *

Soon enough though we are on our way. "You never asked about any of my science experiments. Are you not interested or is there something else?"  
I shrug, but then tell him everything. "There are aspects of science I enjoy. There are other aspects that bore me to pieces. Other pieces frighten me. When you lead me through your lab to your private loft, I saw that you were a genius in many different fields. On top of that, I heard the rumors of using your prisoners for science experiments. It took me a long time to figure out if I was a science experiment, a personal play toy or something more. By the time I figured out I was your confidential solace, I knew I didn't want to know anything that would make me worry, hate, or be disgusted by you. Ignorance being bliss. I just wanted to be the one you could count on, especially when you said one of your lead scientist had betrayed you. It crushed me to see you of all powerful yet sweet and devoted mechs stabbed in the back."  
A few minutes of walking along and I know he is digesting everything I admitted. When he does break the silence it's so soft I almost didn't hear him over the padding of our pedes.  
"You know that you femmes were becoming extinct, right?" (nod) "The Autobots, lead by Optimus Prime jettisoned our AllSpark and thus the Well and it's precious water were going dry. It had been a guarded secret for so long that very few understood how the Well's properties actually effected procreation. As our planet and its race were dying, we lost all hope of making a future. I wanted to try saving our future as well as our planet. Mindwipe told me he had information about spark-bonds. I trusted him…." He ends that with a disgusted huff.

"You said he wasn't even Cybertronian? Who was he really then and what was he up to all this time?"  
"A race called Morgans. Huge nasty trans-morphing beings that were able to hide their biology by concealing it under harvested Cybertronian paneling. Disgusting and sneaky. Their hope was to control and breed us back into servitude. After all we had accomplished by breaking away from the Quintesons and making ourselves a proud independent race, now this other race was hoping to use sacred sparks bonds to enslave us?! NO! And he used my own experiments against my own people. I was such a fool to put that much trust into him." The padding becomes stomping. "And worst of all, I had to admit my folly to that arrogant backstabbing twerp Starscream! All this time I hadn't trusted HIM when I shouldn't have been trusting one of MY OWN! Admission wasn't the worst., the worst was the compassion I got from him because… he knew I could never do such a thing against our own kind. Even his best friend's mate turned against her love and he didn't hate me once he found out the truth…..Primus help me."  
"Oh."

There really wasn't much I could say to that watching him rub a furious hand over his wilting antenna. I would feel pretty humiliated too if all my hard work and research to save my people was actually turned around to enslave rather that free and then have to admit my error of trust to one I despised most in the faction. Ouch.  
"Where is Mindwipe now?" I finally find the courage to ask.  
"I'm not sure. I've heard rumors, but haven't found solid fact. This whole new Prime thing just derailed me a bit as well."  
"Would that new Prime know?"  
In two steps he is blocking my path holding me still. "What are you getting at?"  
"Maybe the Autobots are not the true enemy but this Mindwipe guy. Maybe there is a chance to combine forces and go after these bastards."  
Releasing my arms he nods. "Yeah, we joined forces with them once before and lost Starscream in the process due to Galavtron's arrogance and Starscream's sacrifice. Not that I ever fully trusted Starscream, but…," his thoughts trail off again.  
"Shockwave, maybe the war isn't over, just the enemy has changed." I'm trying with all I have to encourage one of his strongest attributes. One that I won't lie, turns me on. Not arrogance, but true pride and honor. "I'm sure those Autobot scientist could use your brains as well. After all, you did work with this bastard."  
The optic narrows, "Are you sure you're just a mere Park Ranger?"  
Pursing my lips I poke him back in the chest, "I know a predator when I hear one. I know a bully. They picked the wrong race to mess with and the wrong scientist to betray."  
Three deep breaths later, my hand is tugged, "Come on, I have a call to make."

* * *

~~0~~  
With renewed energy, we make excellent time back to our original shelter. At the foot of the trail that leads up to our shelter, he nudges me up while flicking a hand to the shuttle's hangar. "Go on, I'm going to make that call."  
Even though I want to go with him, I know he needs to do this privately. So with a parting kiss, I leave him to his mission and take our gear up to our home.  
~~0~~

* * *

Must have been bushed because I didn't even feel him come to berth. Light across our berth is now waking me and I open my heavy optics to a lazy hand caressing my chest. A warm breath and a soft deep hum against it as well has my optics closing back down. There is something Shockwave is whispering to his sparkling and I don't want him to stop. Those deep toned harmonics so close to my spark leaves me melting.  
I don't stop him, but a kick within the gestational pod changes his soft words to something like a chuckle. Hummm that laugh feels so good.  
"Hey there, little one. You must have started your second stage if you are doing that now."  
Another thump and I have to feel it too. Kaki hand meets lilac over the thumping little one. Silently together we feel this life we have created together.  
"How do you feel about going up to Iacon today?"  
"Are you asking me, or the little one?" I have to tease him, it's just too endearing to see him this way.  
"Funny," but kisses the thump and then my hand. "But seriously, are you up to traveling?"  
Now I might be a bit tired, but I'm not that tired! "Um, why would I not be?"  
"Because, incubating Mother…," scoots himself so that we are looking optic to optic, "That's not dawn's morning light you are bathed in, it's sunset."  
Cocking a brow I know he has to be teasing me again. The violet helm softly turns right and left to say he isn't joking.  
"Damn. Yeah I guess we must be at the second stage then." I know that doesn't answer his question because he hasn't moved still giving me the critical-optic. To ease the concern, roll to the side and cup his handsome cheek. "Umm, I would love to go for a jaunt up to Iacon with you. Only if I get to meet this illustrious brother of yours."  
"Umm," he uses the tone right back at me, "I think that can be arranged. Do require any more rest?"  
"Heh, I can always sleep in Boltz if I need to. I say we head out as soon as possible."  
"Alright. First though you refuel and no arguments as to how much."  
I have to grunt back at that one, "Yeah you try to force that on me, but keep in mind, someone has dropped into their pod now and it sits right on top of some vital organs. You carry the next one."  
"Hardly." He does try to pull that lofty mechly smirk of his, but I know the scientist in him wouldn't mind one bit being the carrier. So as he rolls off, I give his lovely aft the light smack this time.  
"Ranger! Watch it!" Shooting off a glare and then striding away.  
"I am, dear," shoving a tongue into my cheek to hold back a giggle. That does stall him making him turn back to find the meaning of my retort. "Excellent retreat, Commander," finished off with a licked lip and glaring at his tone aft.  
Optic wide he snorts, "RETREAT? Never!" Then the chin dips down, giving off the most sultry look of his optic, "Baiting a trap more like." To finish laying the trap, walks himself right out the door grabbing his towel on the way out.  
Ohhh, he's going down to the water fall to bathe before we head out. "Oh frag!" In two seconds I'm out the door with my own towel falling into his trap. No need to show up in Iacon stinking like a wild animal, even if moments under the waterfall can get that intense.

~~0~~

* * *

I've never been to Iacon before and here we come deep in the night. She's only got a few lights on making her lit windows look like more stars against the sky and signifying most of the city is asleep. There is one place, though, that is a blaze of lights. This is where we head.  
Already Shockwave has received clearance to enter Iacon's airspace as not to get blown to bits. Now they are pinging him again, "Hangar 5, ah… Boltz." It's clear this new voice doesn't know exactly what to call Shockwave. Using his ships name is ambiguous and respectful enough.

Shockwave is gentle in his approach as not to give any of these military personal a reason to harm him. We both know that a lot of bots (and humans) are going to be quite nervous about one of the few Cybertronians who refuse to bow to the new Prime coming into their hallowed base of operations.  
The doors are open wide on the building painted with a green 5. Sliding in, a green and yellow mech triple changer is waving us in until crossing his forearms in the universal 'stop' sign. From there, Shockwave takes a deep breath and begins Boltz's shut down procedures.

With the final switch done, we can now hear the soft noises of a late night hangar. There's a couple of armed humans out there giving Boltz a wary eye. A couple more bots in another corner also have their arms at the ready. The green mech is staying where he can see us through the windshield. "Well, here goes nothing. I won't lie, I am concerned about what kind of reception we are going to receive."  
I lay a hand to his cannoned wrist lifting a weak smile up to him, "I'm very worried, too. Keep in mind, I've been an only child, a hermit, a POW and a secret confidante. I don't want my lack of social graces to go badly for you, Guardian."  
He might be sliding out of his seat, but he's cupping my cheek bringing our forehelms together, "I would have it no other way than to have you by my side. We do this together, alright?"  
To my chagrin, a weak tear slips down my cheek. "So much for being a strong mate at your side."  
I go to brush it away, but find my hand stopped and his lips taking the tear, "You are perfect. Come on, lets go see what Soundwave has to say."

Shockwave leaps down from Boltz hatch but doesn't acknowledge the green mech stating his name in a neutral tone; not confrontational nor exactly welcoming either. Instead, he is turning back to take my hips (with my hands to his broad shoulders). lifting me down. I could have made the jump we both know, but this is a way for him to show a bit of his softer domestic side, hoping to quell some of the other's concerns in the room.  
It seemed to work for the green mech stutters in his words, "Sh-Shockwave? I didn't know you were bringing… a guest?"  
"Springer, I would like for you to meet my mate, Ranger. Ranger, this is Springer who was a Commander in the Wrecker's division." An even respectful tone to a tense introduction.  
With Springer at a loss for words, the orange and yellow flamed mech beside him reaches his hand and huge smile out. "Welcome to Iacon, Shockwave and Ranger. I'm Firelock, Officer of the Watch tonight."  
"Firelock? You have a resemblance to Rodimus Prime," Shockwave shakes his hand in return greeting.  
A respectful dip of his helm and his smile falters for a moment in taking my hand. "He was my father."  
"Was?" Shockwave's optic goes wide.  
Firelock nods, "Yes, he held the Morgans back so Ultra Magnus and I could get a set of captured femmes to our shuttle. He never had a chance but gave us all one."

Shockwave gives a hard swallow to that news. I can feel the gratitude he is giving off to more femmes being saved. "H-how are they?"  
The young emblazoned mech relaxes a lot more seeing the feared nemesis of the Autobots truly concerned. "They are fine, Shockwave. Much better now that they are back in their mate's arms and the sparks reunited. Come, let's get you inside. We can talk more there."  
"Not yet." Springer lays a hand to the orange shoulder. In his other hand he holds up a disk, "Shockwave, we can not have your cannon active while here in Iacon. I will not ask you to remove it, but I have to inhibit it. Likewise, Ranger, your side arm."  
Shockwave's back pulls up taught and firm to being unarmed and unable to protect either of us. No one moves though. It all hinges on Shockwave. Springer is clearly not going to let either of us take another step and Firelock is not happy about having to put such a condition on a guest. The green optics on the younger mech are pleading for Shockwave accept the situation.

The cannon arm comes up in a non-threatening way. "I will accept the inhibitor, but my mate has a right to defend herself. I will not allow her side arm to be removed or disabled. I know I can still handle myself in hand to hand combat whereas she… should not."  
'Should not' not 'can't', I like the way he phrased that leaving them to ponder what he means. It worked because the orange and green mechs share confused expressions while sticking the disk to the violet cannon.  
"I think we can live with that compromise seeing how it's a hand pistol and not something more," Firelock gives his warmest smile back. "Come on, I believe you came to see someone, am I correct?"  
Springer is not as happy about the compromise but knows he is out ranked, for the moment. With the inhibitor activated, he releases the cannon and takes rear guard as we follow Firelock into the main building.

Being on my mate's left, I slip my hand around his elbow just above the cannon-natural arm joint. His hand comes up to pat it into his arm and we follow the young officer down the corridors. Shockwave says nothing just taking it all in. I'm a bit nervous and ever so grateful to be at his side.  
"With it being late in the night, most of the shifts are asleep. Of course we still have our night rounds," Firelock almost sounds like a tour guide rather than a guard.  
Shockwave just gives a hum of approval but says nothing more. His spark rate is picking up getting nervous to seeing his brother thusly making my own pick up. I know he said he sent a message asking to see Soundwave, but they didn't get a chance to actually talk. Now they are going to be talking: face to face at that. His hand gives mine a tighter squeeze.  
When we don't respond, Firelock glances back to check on us. His optics narrow in on the badge my shoulder still bears. "I'm not familiar with that faction symbol. Who is your allegiance to?"  
Springer chuckles, "Firelock, she's a Park Ranger. Her faction is Cybertron's Sonic Canyons."  
I smile back to him, glad that he understands I only want to serve our planet's natural beauties. My smile fades though when he pushes out a short clipped question.  
"But I don't understand what you would be doing with him of all bots."  
Firelock growls out the former Wrecker's name in warning. Still I know what they are all asking: Autobot, Decepticon, or Neutral sympathizer?

My hand crimps down to the strong arm supporting me. "When my home was over run in battle, the Guardian of Cybertron took me in." No I certainly wasn't going to say I was dragged in or who overran my home. I figure only to reveal what needs to be said. "He protected me."  
The antenna smile and the golden optic dims a bit. "It was the least I could do for one who protects what is most precious." Our spark bond laughs knowing his troops had done the least for me, but he had done the greatest for me.  
"So you two then …bonded?" Firelock beams hearing a good romance story,  
Charming Shockwave shrugs his shoulders, "It took time, but eventually yes."  
Springer is no fool. Those narrowing optics show that he KNOWS we are holding stuff back but isn't sure what we are holding back is dangerous or just plain personal.

Just as he is about to press another question to us, Firelock takes us round another corner.  
"Ah, here we are: Rec-room." Before he opens the door though, he hands me a key card. "Your accommodations on the B level. Enjoy your stay and if there is anything you need, please let us know."  
I tuck the card into one of my breast pockets and the door is opened. Springer continues to follow us in but then breaks left to sit at a table. I'm guessing he is going to be our shadow for the whole time we are here. I can't blame them too much. A new Prime, a new world and one of the most dangerous recluses just walked right in. He wouldn't be a very good commander if he wasn't wary.  
It warms my spark though when a pink and blue femme takes the seat next to him placing a kiss to the cheek. At least there is someone who will help distract him a little in a personal way.

The room is a good size, nearly as large as a banquet hall. Looks like it has multiple uses but right now, a bit of a night club. A red mech is sitting at the piano playing and singing out a soft song. There are a few couples dancing close together. A set of purple wings catches my attention.  
Apparently they caught Shockwave's attention too because he stiffens just as the femme is turned by her partner: Royal blue, snow white and a few accents of daffodil yellow. "Is that…"  
"Yes, that's my brother ….Soundwave," softly he says.  
Hearing his name through the bridge of the song, with his excellent hearing (Shockwave did say he was a communications officer), the blue and white visored helm turns to us.  
"Shockwave….," he breathes but no one moves.


	5. Chapter 5

Wave of Shock 5  
{once again, set in my Prime Blood AU, post war Iacon}

If it wasn't such a tense situation, it would be cute the way the brothers each slip their hands into their mates' for added reinforcement. Instead, each of us femmes are watching our brother-in-laws, ready to pounce of either attacks our loves. That too would be cute if it wasn't so serious.  
No one moves after they acknowledge each other's presence by vocalizing their names. I am a complete stranger to not only this city, this base, but also this faction that is housing Soundwave and his mate. I know I need to be strong but my body shivers.  
Shockwave turns from his brother to his mate. That look in his optic is asking if I'm afraid and also if I'm physically well. I just don't know what to say or feel so I wave back my worry for his spark and relationship with his brother. He smiles seeing that we are more concerned for each other than the potential of being attacked by a family member or even a rival faction. He surges back through our bondlink that he is just fine and punctuates it with a squeeze to my hand.

Skywarp can see that everyone is a bit nervous in this room with so many optics watching and just not sure what to say to each other. "Soundwave, would it be alright if we adjourned to our quarters. It might be a bit more private and hospitable."  
The royal blue mech looks up to the older violet one. "You are welcome in my home."  
No emotions, just a statement of fact with a respectful choice of words. Shockwave simply nods back and steps aside for them to lead the way. On the way to the door, Skywarp grabs a bottle of vintage grade from the bar and four crystal cut cubes. Shockwave releases my hand, to loop it around my waist keeping me close to his side and cannon at the ready should anyone threaten us. Offline or not, it will still hurt to be barrel-whipped by it.  
Springer tries to rise and follow us out, but Soundwave waves a hand in warning not to follow. The green one sneers at the move, but his mate crimps her own hand down to his green arm in warning. "Springer, please. You have to trust them sometime."  
He huffs but thrusts a finger at all of us, "I'm warning you all-"

Shockwave doesn't even respond to the threat. He really can't blame Springer too much. The war hasn't been over very long considering how long it has raged, trust is still something everyone is working on. For some it's easier than others, even between family members.  
No one says anything else as the four of us leave following the former Decepticon Third in Command to his private apartment on the second floor of the officer's tower.  
A bright blue 'B' welcomes us as we exit the elevator. Soundwave takes us right, and down a few doors to where his and Skywarp's stamped name plate is set beside a key pad much like one might find on an Elite Penthouse Suite. To the left I see the guest quarters we have been assigned. Soundwave taps in the code but stands aside to let his mate and guests enter first. There is one thing I can say for Soundwave, he does have excellent manners.

Inside we find a lithe royal blue and black flyer rising off the couch with a book in his hand. "Mother, you are back early."  
Skywarp smiles to the young adult mech with a medical insignia on his shoulder but no other faction insignia. "Yes we are, Thunderwarp. We felt a little bit more privacy would be more appropriate. Son, I would like for you to meet Soundwave's brother Shockwave and his mate Ranger."  
Shockwave holds out his hand in a neutral but respectful greeting, "Hello, Thunderwarp."  
Likewise I reach out to the young adult mech, "Hello."  
"Welcome to Iacon. I hope your stay is peaceful." Warm and ever so respectful, I'm sure he is a calming presence to his patients. Likewise he is smart enough to see when it is time to leave. "Melody is sound asleep. She went down without a fuss. Ravage is in her room as well."  
"Thank you for sitting for us." Soundwave nods to his step-son.  
The young mech smiles back, "You never have to worry, it is always my pleasure. Alright, I will see you tomorrow. Nice to meet you both," he gives us a both a final nod before letting himself out.  
So that is the son of her first mate that she gave to the neutrals to raise. "He's a medic?" I try to start a welcoming yet neutral conversation.  
Skywarp motions for us to take the couches near the open French doors to the patio that over looks the city. With the tower being an octagon pillar, some of the outside windows will face the interior courtyard. Personally, I do like how this room faces south to my home…correction; our home.  
Soundwave pours the vintage while his mate explains. "Yes. He was raised by Skyfire and Skylynx along with Skyfire's son Igneous on a hidden planet. Firestar taught him to become a medical assistant when he became of age."  
From there the crystal cubes are handed out. I hold mine but not sure what to do with it. Shockwave though takes a drink from his without waiting for anyone to needlessly post a toast. Skywarp might frown to that, but Soundwave follows his brother in taking a silent drink. Still I just hold my drink and look out over the scenery the open door offers.

Long tense and still silent moments pass between the once close brothers as they look into their drinks but not at each other.  
"You both are stubborn afts!" Skywarp finally slams her empty cube to the table. Unfortunately, her slam awakens her infant daughter forcing her to leave the room. Soundwave does look up but with his mask and visor up, it's hard to read his expression.  
Shockwave looks back to his nearly empty cube. Still he has nothing to say out loud even though I feel a vast amount of emotions rippling down our bond.  
He's thrilled to see his brother alive, healthy, and with a family. He's crushed to see him so easily aligning with this new leadership and abandoning all they had fought for all so easily. It's good to be accepted, but yet has no idea what to say. He will always love his brother even if he can not stand the choices he has made. It's a rollercoaster of emotions.

Our thoughts are broken from each other when we hear a cabinet open. Soundwave crouches down to pull something out before closing it back up. With tentative steps, comes back to the table holding our cubes. He sets Shockwave's geometric helmet down in the center along with a picture frame then pulls back to refill his cube.  
The only way he could have the discarded helmet is if he had gone to the Tower. The only reason he would bring the photo back is to hold onto a piece of his brother. Here he is offering them back. Shockwave reaches out picking up the picture by bypassing the helmet.  
This time when I look at the image, I notice that young-Shockwave has two hands. Both of the brothers seem to have a rather relaxed form against each other like best friends goofing off for the camera. Certainly not the two tense battered beings before me now.

Shockwave finally speaks. "This was a long time ago."  
"Yes, it was. Father, took it didn't he?" Soundwave refills Shockwave's cube but says nothing about how I haven't touched mine.  
Shockwave nods silent once again. When it feels like the conversation is going to stall again, I ask, "When was it taken?"  
Soundwave gives Shockwave a chance to answer it, but when he doesn't, he does. "Just as I was entering the University. It was just a few weeks later that I dropped out to join him on the already established Nemesis."  
"How did your parents take the news?"  
Both of them look sharply at me, but it is my love that answers by covering my hand. "They never knew." I guess it is a surprise to Soundwave that Shockwave hadn't already told me.  
With us to be parents in the near future, I cover his hand and lean into him, "I'm so sorry, my love."  
"It's alright," he responds with such a soft tone it's as if no one else was in the room with us. There really doesn't need to be anything else explained of their past. Both are leaving it at that or at least refusing to speak of it.  
Soundwave does ask of me, though: "Ranger, what of your parents?"  
I shrug, "I just don't know. Once the war started and communication got choppy, lies spread, truths distorted, so many escaping the planet…. There wasn't much for me to hope for and no idea where to even start looking. I was already pretty remotely out and didn't really didn't want to abandon my post. I knew one thing was certain, I would be safe in my Canyon and maybe I could preserve something as the world crashed around me."  
Soundwave leans in to scrutinize me carefully. I do not pull back from his probing gaze but Shockwave does lean in to block his view with a dark warning, "Do not even think of it, Soundwave."

Oh, right telepathy. "Shockwave, I will give him permission if it will ease his concerns."  
Sharply the violet helm snaps back to me, "No. If he can not trust you being at my side, than I have no need of him."  
In nothing flat the yellow visor and battle mask are tossed to the table beside the purple helmet. "Like you trust me now?! I do not have to read your mind, I can read your body well enough to know you do not have any trust in anyone but yourself!"  
Shockwave launches to his feet, "I did not come for this!" With a sharp yank to my hand he makes it clear we are to leave. I can't help but yelp to the rough jerk to my pedes.  
I'm not the only one who launches to his pedes, though. Soundwave is on his ready to do whatever he needs to in order to stop violence in his home. Or at least that was what I thought until the softest of hands lays where ours join.  
"Shockwave, please….wait."  
Shockwave stops but says nothing, so Soundwave continues. "We have lost so much already. Please, I can't bear the thought of losing you, too. I worried constantly for you, but also had faith that you would survive. I was so proud when Lord Megatron asked you to hold Cybertron in his stead, I knew She would be safe. I knew She would protect you as well."

Shockwave still says nothing for a few moments, but nor does he move. The grip to my hand softens a little. "What do you want from me?" The older brother finally asks.  
Soundwave lets go of the lilac hand to gesture behind us both. "Say hello to your niece."  
We both turn and there is a sweet innocent sparkling of purple with yellow swirls about her limbs. On her helm are two cute little aerials. Clutched to her hands is a small black toy cyber-panther matching the big one at his mistress's side. Skywarp has a warning look for the mechs, but a soft one for her yawning sparkling.  
The uncle steps away from his mate to look at his brother's little blessing. Skywarp slips the little one into his strong arms when she looks to him curiously.  
"Hello Little One," that deep voice is ever so warm and welcoming. Reminds me of the tone he used to give me when returning to a his private quarters and really was pleased for private company.

Under the careful watch of the parents and guard-cat, Shockwave goes back to his place on the couch, settling down. "Who is this?" He asks tapping her little toy.  
"Row-er." The little one gives an attempt to mimicking Ravage's snarl-meow.  
I can't help but chuckle a little at that. Now normally, I would give an animal his wide open space, but I can see Ravage is a trusted domesticated friend. So I crouch down holding my hand out allowing him to either explore my scent or warn me not to come near him. "I suppose you taught her that?"  
Ravage's ears rotate and the head cocks curious to my new sound and scent. I can see him debating whether to leave his little mistress's side to check me out or not. When Soundwave sits down beside his brother, that gives the guardian the security to check me out.  
The head pulls up taught and proud, with a prowl of warning, but also curiosity. I don't move as he circles me first and gives me a good sniff in the process. He comes closer to my offered hands giving them a very careful inspection. I'm not surprised that he finds the dirt of my pedes most fascinating. So much that the lips pull back and parts the mouth a little to get full taste of the scent. To help the poor guy out, I put my aft to the floor, stretching my legs out completely.  
"Ravage, NO!" Skywarp gasps when the big cat puts his rump into my lap, so he can wrap both paws around my pedes and nuzzle into them. The big hind legs are on either side of my hips and the tail is now swishing back and forth over my chest and face.  
The cat doesn't listen to her and I don't mind one bit. "It's alright," I openly laugh digging my hand into the tail's base giving him a good scratch. That only seems to activate his motor giving a nice deep purring vibration against my legs.  
"Enjoying yourself?" My lover teases me with a snigger.  
"Oh, and what about you?" I tease right back seeing him playing with the toy cat so Melody will giggle.  
"Its call practicing," he winks an antenna back at me.

OH! So he's ready to spill the beans! I flood our link with all the love I can find and his optic glows a little brighter.  
It's Skywarp to ask though, "Practicing for what, Shockwave? Going to get yourself a pet?"  
Shockwave nuzzles into Melody's forehelm giving it a kiss. "Maybe, but probably not until after our sparkling arrives."  
"WHAT?" Soundwave and Skywarp blink to stare at him. Ravage only lifts his helm for a second before beginning to lick the dust and other outdoor scents off my pedes.  
That delicious rumbling laugh comes off Shockwave's chest making the whole room come alive with grand warmth. Even Melody starts giggling into hic-ups which of course has me laughing (that panther's tickling tongue isn't helping either).  
Soundwave takes his daughter to his shoulder to help her hic-ups but Skywarp is the one to interrogate his brother. "What did you say?"  
Shockwave and I reach our hands out towards each other. "I said, I'm going to be a father. Ranger and I are going to be parents."  
Fists to her hips, I can see the Commander in that fierce gaze of hers. Wow, I certainly don't want to get on her bad side! "When?"  
There's such a loving look in that optic for me which normally he would only give in private. Seeing how he will give it to me among these two shows that he his allowing them into his trust. That makes my spark swell to seeing the healing begin. Just to melt me further, he slides off the couch to the floor at my side. The cannon might prop him up over both my and Ravage's hips, but his hand slides over our budding little one.  
"Already in stage two, it won't be too long now."  
Such a rich sweet tone that I lean in to nuzzle into his fore helm. "Not long at all." 


End file.
